Broadside (music)
A broadside (also known as a broadsheet) is a single sheet of cheap paper printed on one side, often with a ballad, rhyme, news and sometimes with woodcut illustrations. They were one of the most common forms of printed material between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, particularly in Britain, Ireland and North America and are often associated with one of the most important forms of traditional music from these countries, the ballad. The nature of broadsides With primitive early printing presses, printing on a single sheet of paper was the easiest and most inexpensive form of printing available and for much of their history could be sold for as little as a penny.B. Capp, ‘Popular literature’, in B. Reay, ed., Popular Culture in Seventeenth-Century England (Routledge, 1985), p. 198. They could also be cut in half lengthways to make ‘broadslips’, or folded to make chapbooks and where these contained several songs such collections were known as 'garlands'.G. Newman and L. E. Brown, Britain in the Hanoverian Age, 1714-1837: An Encyclopedia (Taylor & Francis, 1997), pp. 39-40. The earliest broadsides that survive date from the early sixteenth century, but relatively few survive before 1550.B. R. Smith, The Acoustic World of Early Modern England: Attending to the O-factor (University of Chicago Press, 1999), p. 177. From 1556 the Stationers Company in London attempted to force registration of all ballads and some 2,000 were recorded between then and 1600, but, since they were easy to print and distribute, it is likely that far more were printed.A. W. Kitch, 'Printing bastards, monsterous birth broadsides in early modern England', in D. A. Brooks, Printing and Parenting in Early Modern England (Ashgate, 2005), p. 227. Scholars often distinguish between the earlier blackletter broadsides, using larger heavy ‘gothic’ print, most common up to the middle of the seventeenth century, and lighter whiteletter, roman or italic typefaces, that were easier to read and became common thereafter.G. Taylor, J. Lavagnino and T. Middleton, Thomas Middleton and Early Modern Textual Culture: A Companion to the Collected Works (Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 202. Broadsides were produced in huge numbers, with over 400,000 being sold in England annually by the 1660s, probably close to their peak of popularity.B. Capp, ‘Popular literature’, in B. Reay, ed., ''Popular Culture in Seventeenth-Century England (Routledge, 1985), p. 199. Many were sold by travelling chapmen in city streets and at fairs or by balladeers, who sang the songs printed on their broadsides in an attempt to attract custom.M. Spufford, Small Books and Pleasant Histories: Popular Fiction and Its Readership in Seventeenth-Century England (Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 111-28. In Britain broadsides began to decline in popularity in the seventeenth century as initially chapbooks and later bound books and newspapers, began to replace them, until they appear to have died out in the nineteenth century. They lasted longer in Ireland, and although never produced in such huge numbers in North America, they were significant in the eighteenth century and provided an important medium of propaganda, on both sides, in the American War of Independence.M. Savelle, Seeds of liberty: The Genesis of the American Mind (Kessinger Publishing, 2005), p. 533. Most of the knowledge of broadsides in England comes from the fact that several significant figures chose to collect them, including Samuel Pepys (1633–1703) Robert Harley, 1st Earl of Oxford and Mortimer (1661–1724), in what became Roxburghe Ballads.B. Sweers, Electric Folk: The Changing Face of English Traditional Music (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 45. In the eighteenth century there were several printed collections, including Thomas D'Urfey's Wit and Mirth: or, Pills to Purge Melancholy (1719–20), Bishop Thomas Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765), and John Ritson's, The Bishopric Garland (1784). In Scotland similar work was undertaken by figures including Robert Burns and Walter Scott in The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border (1802–03). One of the largest collections was made by Sir Frederick Madden who collected some 30,000 songs now in the 'Madden Collection' in the Cambridge University Library http://microformguides.gale.com/Data/Introductions/30330FM.htm. Broadside ballads Broadside ballads (also known as 'roadsheet’, 'broadsheet', ‘stall’, ‘vulgar’ or ‘come all ye’ ballads) varied from what has been defined as the ‘traditional’ ballad, which were often tales of some antiquity, which has frequently crossed national and cultural boundaries and developed as part of a process of oral transmission.A. N. Bold, The Ballad (Routledge, 1979), p. 5. In contrast broadside ballads often lacked their epic nature, tended not to possess their artistic qualities and usually dealt with less consequential topics. However, confusingly many ‘traditional’ ballads, as defined particularly by the towering figures in their collection, Svend Grundtvig for Denmark and Francis Child for England and Scotland, only survive as broadsides.T. A. Green, Folklore: An Encyclopedia of Beliefs, Customs, Tales, Music, and Art (ABC-CLIO, 1997), p. 352. Among the topics of broadside ballads were love, religion, drinking-songs, legends, and early journalism, which included disasters, political events and signs, wonders and prodigies.B. Capp, ‘Popular literature’, in B. Reay, ed., Popular Culture in Seventeenth-Century England (Routledge, 1985), p. 204. Generally broadside ballads included only the lyrics, often with the name of a known tune that would fit suggested below the title. See also *Popular prints *Broadside Electric References *''Broadside Ballads: Songs from the Streets, Taverns, Theatres and Countryside of 17th Century England (incl songs, orig melodies, and chord suggestions)'' by Lucie Skeaping (2005), Faber Music Ltd. ISBN 0-571-52223-8 (Information and samples of more than 80 broadside ballads and their music) *''The British Broadside Ballad and Its Music'' by Claude M. Simpson (1966), Rutgers University Press. Out of Print. No ISBN. (540 broadside ballad melodies from all periods) Notes External links *American Song Sheets, Duke University Libraries Digital Collections *Bodleian Library of Broadside Ballads *English Broadside Ballad Archive, University of California-Santa Barbara Category:Song forms